Auckland Choral at the Auckland Town Hall

By WILLIAM DART


It has become fashionable, from Busoni onwards, to talk of the operatic qualities of Verdi's Requiem, but theatrical is probably the sounder description.

On Saturday night Auckland Choral stressed this and hell almost threw its gates wide open during the Dies Irae, with fanfaring trumpets lashing in from either side of the circle.

If you were sitting between them, (as I was) the effect was the sort of stereo that had hi-fi buffs reeling in their late 50s lounges. It was a coup de theatre, only let down, alas, by a few gremlin notes in the fanfares.

This was a moment clearly enjoyed by conductor Peter Watts, who brought an intense energy to the evening. He held back little in the great fugal moments, despite the fact that fugal entries were not always clear or confident, single-mindedly pursuing the dramatic whole.

Operatic connections were most convincingly made by Patricia Wright in her final Libera Me.

Twenty years before he wrote the Requiem, Verdi had revealed just how potent the combination of soprano and choir could be in the great Miserere from Il Trovatore. Wright could have been Leonora, beautifully bringing us back to earth after a reprise of the storming Dies Irae.

One of the disappointments of Auckland Choral's 1998 performance of this work was the sad limitations of the tenor soloist. This time around, with Patrick Power in excellent voice, memories of six years ago were banished.

For those who wanted operatic fervour in the Ingemisco it was there, in heaps, with inspirational phrasing in lines such as Qui Mariam absolvisti.

Helen Medlyn seemed unusually subdued, although her Agnus Dei, warmly duetted with Wright, was one of the highlights. Grant Dickson, impressive in range, suffered from excessive vibrato. Throughout, finely tuned quartet work, only occasionally overpowered by Verdi's lusty orchestration, was the order of the day, thrilling in the chromatic falls of Quam olim Abrahae promisi.

Despite some earth-shattering climaxes, the Auckland Philharmonia seemed a little below par. There was detail wanting in all those places that Verdi's inventive orchestration mercilessly exposes, such as the cello lines in Domine Jesu.